[JURIST] A judge for the US District Court for the Northern District of California [official website] on Tuesday ordered Oracle to reimburse Google [corporate websites] about $1 million for costs incurred during the course of the companies’ recent patent litigation [materials]. The trial concluded in May [JURIST report] with a verdict that Google had not infringed on Oracle copyrights and patents when developing the Android mobile device software. While Google’s victory prompted Judge William Alsup to order the reimbursement to cover the search giant’s share of fees paid to a court-appointed expert witness [IDG News report], Alsup did reject Google’s arguments that Oracle should also reimburse $2.9 million for costs related to document discovery. Oracle could have sought as much as $1 billion from Google if Oracle won the August 2010 lawsuit alleging that the Android system violated patents and copyrights Oracle holds on the Java programming language. Oracle has stated its intent to appeal.

In May a federal jury held [JURIST report] that Google’s use of the application programming interfaces was not an infringement of Oracle’s patents. Earlier that month the jury found itself deadlocked [JURIST report] on the issue of whether Google’s use could be considered “fair use” making it difficult for Oracle to win a large damage award. The case went to trial [JURIST report] in April after settlement negotiations broke down.